Tipex Posted August 12, 2013 Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 I'm fed up with our Talk Talk router, it must be the biggest pile of crap i've ever had the misfortune to use, so am going to buy a proper one! The question is, without spending silly money, what should I get? Is it worth getting a dual band one or will none of my devices support dual band anyway? I'll be picking something up from either Staples, Maplin or PC world so needs to be something off the shelf from one of those. Last week Staples had a load of old stock (last years models I assume) dual band routers going cheap, probably should have picked one up then! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arch Posted August 12, 2013 Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 I went with this http://www.asus.com/Networking/RTN66U/ as I was having issues streaming audio from iphones to wireless speaker on my old router. Phones now connect on the 5G band and streaming works fine. All the other devices are connected on either the 2.4g band or via homeplugs. Has been faultless so far, range stretches well through all floors although our house is seemingly made of tissue paper. It may be a bit of overkill for you I don't know, I wanted it because of both bands, guest network setup and other features like being able to stick a custom firmware on it. Oh, and because it was nicknamed 'The Dark Knight' when it first appeared on sale. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Biscuits Posted August 12, 2013 Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 any of the NETGEAR are okay bang for buck, just avoid BELKIN like the clap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tipex Posted August 12, 2013 Author Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 So will I see any advantage from the dual band bit? I'm pretty sure i'd need to buy a new wireless adaptor for the laptop as it's quite old, but will any other devices such as the PS3/Wii/Sky box/iPhone/Nexus 7 etc see any advantage? I guess I should anyway to future proof myself, will the Netgear stuff be better than that Asus one above? It's in stock locally at PC World for £109.99 which is more than I wanted to spend really but i'm happy to stretch to that if it's worth it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calm Chris Posted August 12, 2013 Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 Always spend more than you wanted, and with luck you spend less often. Has age taught you no tricks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CarMad Posted August 12, 2013 Report Share Posted August 12, 2013 Have a look at broadband buyer, a good place to pick up wireless kit and they have plenty of ratings and reviews. If you are willing to spend £100+ then there is always the option of 802.11ac which will soon be on all of the new smartphones that get launched. It offers better coverage and more throughput, however nothing will take advantage of it yet so it might be a false economy for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burble Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 I went with this http://www.asus.com/Networking/RTN66U/ That's a 'cable' router and I assume that Tipex has got ADSL. In which case that router would work (I've gone one, it's great) but Tipex would also need an ethernet ADSL modem. Asus don't seem to do a version of the N66U with an ADSL modem built in but they do the DSL-N55U Annex A which looks very similar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tipex Posted August 13, 2013 Author Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 Can't seem to find that one in stock anywhere but yes, normal ADSL broadband. Seem to recall the Gadget Show recommending the Asus ones so might pop into PC World and see what they have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arch Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 That's a 'cable' router and I assume that Tipex has got ADSL. In which case that router would work (I've gone one, it's great) but Tipex would also need an ethernet ADSL modem. Asus don't seem to do a version of the N66U with an ADSL modem built in but they do the DSL-N55U Annex A which looks very similar. Good point, totally forgot that! My old one, a FritZBox is sat on the floor doing the ADSL duties with the wireless etc switched off, plugged into the Asus. Slipped my mind it wasn't an all in one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveP Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 I bought the asus 55 and it is much better than my old router, but seems to randomly drop the ADSL link and does not seem to want to bring it up back up. So, although it is A-listed it is not problem free. I got mine from Amazon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smudge Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 I'll offer little to no advice here, mainly because I don't know the right answer. However, bearing in all we do is Residential work, this may be of some use. If we don't use a solution based around Cisco, we will use a Draytek router (but only a router). End of. My Tech Manager says they're bullet proof & to the best of my knowledge we haven't had a failure yet. DrayTek - Security Firewalls Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Biscuits Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 Agree Smudge, but Tipex wanted budget PC World stuff. We use Draytek Vigor routers all the time and although a bit of a fiddle to setup, they are rock solid. The Cisco small business gear isn't too bad (Linksys internals) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tipex Posted August 13, 2013 Author Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 Yep I just want to go and pick something up, don't want to order online, and my options are limited, either Tesco, PC World, Staples, Argos or Maplin. I don't mind paying a bit more for something that will give me faultless service and not need replacing for ten years, so long as I can find it in one of the above stores! The thing I like the sound of about the Asus stuff is that it will automatically detect my ISP and all I have to do is input the username and password, in theory anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveP Posted August 13, 2013 Report Share Posted August 13, 2013 Nope, it got that wrong on mine (plus.net), which was the main problem. It seems that if you plug in a working router and then swap it the authentication only happens every 15/30 mins so it appears to work - for a time. draytek are great routers. I have one, it never went wrong - it just worked. There is one here at work and it only gets stressed once about 200 users start to pound it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tipex Posted August 17, 2013 Author Report Share Posted August 17, 2013 Well after reading some reviews I got the ADSL version of the ASUS one mentioned in this thread in the end, as above, it got the settings all wrong when setting itself up, fortunately I'd already researched them as quite a few reviews (and comments above) mentioned it would probably get them wrong, and had them written down so corrected it straight away and it's been spot on. What can I say, it's a revelation compared to the free boxes most ISP's provide, and particularly compared to TalkTalks best offering. My house is particularly solid, solid internal walls, no crappy dry lining or any of that rubbish so a lot of routers struggle, but I get full signal in every corner of the house now, and even at the end of the quite large garden the signal is still around 50%, i've not bothered venturing into the woods to see how far it can go as i'm never likely to need WiFi out there, but I dare say i'd get quite deep before losing signal completely. I'm sure it's not the 'best' available, but at a price I was happy to pay it's far exceeded anything I could have hoped for, and if anyone has signal problems with a 'free' router i'd highly recommend purchasing a 'proper' one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burble Posted August 17, 2013 Report Share Posted August 17, 2013 Excellent. I do find the wireless signal from my Asus is very, very good. Tonnes better than any other router I've tried at home bar a couple of enterprise grade boxes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arch Posted August 18, 2013 Report Share Posted August 18, 2013 Cool. Mines been faultless since I installed it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruiser647 Posted August 18, 2013 Report Share Posted August 18, 2013 Agree Smudge, but Tipex wanted budget PC World stuff. We use Draytek Vigor routers all the time and although a bit of a fiddle to setup, they are rock solid. The Cisco small business gear isn't too bad (Linksys internals) We had Draytek for a while at work and yep - faultless, (apart from the usual weakspot - psus). We changed provider and now we got Zyxel........ and now Technicolour..... Oh well, at least we don't have to support them now!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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